


As A Blonde

by ladyheroines



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternative Universe - Dark, Alternative Universe - Insanity, F/M, series continuation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-21
Updated: 2013-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-05 08:39:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1091870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyheroines/pseuds/ladyheroines
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If she could handle Wally’s death, she would have. Now, this is the person that death has forced her to become. Artemis, Tigress, no longer a hero. No longer all there. (AKA: that dark/insane series continuation I’ve been wanting to write. Spoilers for season two ending. Rated for blood, but no actual violence happens on-screen, thus no archive warning.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	As A Blonde

_“Artemis was Wally’s partner. I need some distance; I need a change. So, let’s see how Tigress does.”_

_“As a hero?”_

_“As a blonde.”_

\---

She went with them on a few missions. Participated as a normal member for four months. She mourned Wally, but she was strong and she had a lot of support. She went over to Roy's(The clone Roy, not the younger, more homicidal one) and helped him raise Lian when Jade couldn't be around and he was out of her depth. Or sometimes she would go just to play with her niece. It was a little awkward, but she started really mending her bond with her sister.

The point was, she seemed okay. Not perfect, but okay. When Dick came over to spend time with her, he reported to the others that she had put most of Wally's things that his parents didn't want in storage, but still had one drawer in their dresser with old shirts and sweatpants and hoodies of his. A few other drawers that used to hold Wally's things were empty completely, and they all suspected she could not force herself to move her stuff into them. Dick felt a little bad about sneaking around and investigating her house, but he needed to see that she was okay, rather than just hear her say it.

All in all, everyone thought she was doing well for the situation.

No one thought it would come to this

No one is really sure how it came to this.

\---

_“Please, Arty, just let me wipe the blood off. Just- just_ tell me some of it is yours.”

_“Do you really want to see me hurt that badly, Jade?”_

_“Artemis, no, I love you, I don’t say it, but I do, sis. How many people’s blood is that? How- how many did you hurt?”_

_The laugh is strange, sharp, and animalistic. Jade has never heard that sound before, but it sends a jolt down her spine, makes her hair stand on end, and the hands dragging the wet rag across her little sister’s face, trying to clear it so she can see her skin colour again, freeze and shake in place._

\---

Kaldur stands, placing a hand on Artemis’ shoulder and looking into her eyes, looking for some clue as to her emotions right now. Artemis is excellent at maintaining a straight face at all times, but her eyes usually show what she is really feeling.

Her eyes are bright, aware and… awake, if that is the word for it. Kaldur has seen her give fiery gazes before, with a deep intensity behind even her most bored expressions, but he has never seen the light in them like is there now. What is odd is it is also accompanied by a dark as well, emotions meant for no one’s eyes but her own hidden behind the brightness in her gaze.

She has bags under her eyes, purple with green veins and tinting to them. The baggage of everything in her past pushing through her face in the form of dark bruises. Kaldur does not remember when they got there in the first place. They hadn’t been there to long ago, but they must have formed slowly or he would have noticed them before now. Would have told her to to take a break.

Almost five months now since Wally has died.

“Very well, Artemis. Maybe retiring from the team is a good idea, at least for awhile. Give yourself some time to truly let Wally rest. If you ever want to come back, we will be happy to have you.”

Artemis smiles, and the darkness in her eyes almost disappears and is replaced with relief, or some form of happiness, at least.

_Almost._

_“Kaldur, to be honest, I don’t think I’m coming back.”_

\---

_“One. Just ‘hurt’ one. Don’t worry, he deserved it.”_

_“One?! I don’t think anyone under six feet could hold that much blood in their entire body!”_

_Artemis’ smile is like her laugh._

_No, not her_ real _laugh._

_Jade has heard her laugh._

_A little crackly, like her voice, just slightly rough, but in a warm way. It has sounded the same since she was a little girl, happy and carefree in a way that a teenager - young woman, now - hardly ever sounds. Especially one having seen and done the things she has._

_This laugh, this new laugh that Artemis makes, that sounds like the Joker slashing the sides of his face to give himself the permanent smile of scars, is not Artemis. This girl standing before her, covered in blood, some of it dripping on the floor of Roy and Jade’s apartment bathroom, some dried and matting, cracking in some places as she breathes deeply, is not Artemis. Not the one Jade knew._

_“Apparently, this is what all the blood inside someone five ten looks like when you drain it out. Who knew, huh?”_

\---

M’Gann shows up, unannounced, on the day before the sixth month anniversary of Wally’s death. She very carefully blocks off her telepathy, so as not to be overtaken by Artemis’ emotions when she comes to see her. She does not want to encroach on her friend’s privacy, and if she had to feel Artemis’ grief on top of her own, it might kill her.

When M’Gann rings, she hears sudden rapid movement inside, and screeching. Then two thuds, and a hastily called “I’m coming!”, and the pounding of stumbling footsteps to the door.

When Artemis flings the door open, she has the smile on her face that she only gets after doing some hard work, like running a marathon or moving furniture, and she has sweat gathering on her forehead that she quickly wipes away with the back of her arm.

“Oh, M’Gann! Sorry, I’m just doing some shifting around. How are you doing?” Artemis asks, the pleased, slightly breathless smile still on her face as she moves aside to let M’Gann in, quickly swinging the door shut behind her.

“No problem! I just came by to see… how you were doing. I haven’t seen you since you quit the Team,” M’Gann says carefully, tapping her forefingers together in front of her as she peers around the living room of the small apartment. Aside from the kitchen table being a yard off to the right and one of the bookshelves being a foot over, everything looks pretty much the same. But there are two other rooms in the house, so maybe she was moving things in there.

M’Gann suddenly realizes she is doing the fiddling thing with her hands again, something she does when anxious, and stops quickly.

Artemis stands there for a minute, still high on the endorphins, slowly drifting back down into reality and settling into a frown as she realizes the reason for M’Gann’s visit.

“I’m okay, really. I’m- I’m not _fine,_ but I’m okay. I just- don’t want to think about,” Artemis says, moving to flop down on the sofa, spreading her legs apart to settle her elbows on her knees, hunching forward a little bit so she staring down at her hands, picking at some dirt underneath her thumbnail.

“Can we just… hang out for awhile and- talk about something else? Here, do you wanna- could you come sit here, against the couch, and maybe grow your hair out a little and let me braid it? My hair’s so thick, you know, I can never manage to fit it into a braid, and I- I just want to... Can I please?” Artemis says, motioning for M’Gann to sit on the floor between her knees. M’Gann pauses, but then nods, moving so she is seated with her back against the couch and leaning into Artemis’ hands. Artemis twists her fingers into the auburn locks, M’Gann growing them out around her fingers, letting it reach waist length before stopping.

Artemis begins humming some song under her breath, and M’gann has only a vague recollection of the tune. It was in one of the animated Disney movies she and Gar watch a lot, she thinks. The one with the purple, disappearing cat, if she remembers correctly.

“How are the younger members of the team doing? No one has gotten injured, right? What’s happening with you and Conner?” Artemis pipes up, having separated all of M’Gann’s hair and beginning to work on the actual braid.

M’Gann considers for a moment that Artemis is just asking these things and doing this to fill time. But. Well.

She remembers one time, in just the second year after the team had formed, when she and Artemis had decided to have a sleepover in the cave, and M’Gann was stressing over what to do for Conner’s birthday, and Artemis had laid on the bed and listened to her talk happily while M’Gann attempted to braid her long blonde ponytail - and failed miserably. They had both laughed and winced in equal measure, the wincing more of phantom sympathy pains on M’Gann’s part, when Artemis tried to undone all the tangles. It took over and hour.

So M’Gann talks about the team. About their training, and who seems to be the best friends with who, and about how adorable and shy Robin and Cassie can be in their relationship and how they are almost constant hand-holders. She talked about how her and Conner had gone on what could only be called a date the other day, about how after what she did - and Artemis doesn’t even pry about what it was that M’Gann screwed up so royally in the first place - they cannot be the same again, but they can be something different, maybe. Something less naive, with more transparency. And how she needs Conner. Needs his morals and the rock he provides.

Artemis stops working her fingers through M’Gann’s hair, at this point, presumably bored with doing and redoing the braid. She sits quietly and listens. M’Gann thinks she whispers something, but she doesn’t make it out, and wonders if it was just her imagination.

\---

_“I never thought there would the day when_ you _were the one trying to convince_ me _to stay on the straight and narrow. This is almost surreal. I am having flashbacks to a lot of childhood fights about you leaving.”_

_“Is that- is that what this is about? God, Artemis, I am not going to leave you again. You don’t have to become a killer in case I decide to go back to the League of Shadows. I have a daughter now. I’m staying clean, I swear. We are just going to be apart again if you start- start-”_

_The blood drips, and uneven rhythm going almost as fast as Jade’s heart. Sometimes it will pause for a moment and the silence will be more terrifying than the DNA falling all over the bathroom tiles._

_“Is this about Wally? Arty, please, I want to help you. You need help. Artemis, look at me-”_

_“I am looking at you.”_

_“-You’re looking right through me. Artemis, who did you kill? Who was he? I need to know. I will help you cover this up. Just promise me it won’t happen again. Artemis, let me help you! Just prom- promise me. Artemis.”_

_Jade’s tears are falling so fast, so suddenly, spilling down her cheeks and dropping off the point of her chin, adding to the frantic rhythm of liquid dripping against the floor. Her voice is so shaky, cracking at random points, and she never thought she would see the day her little sister was covered in this much blood. Blood that’s not her own._

_Artemis smiles again, and Jade’s tears stop falling. The last of them roll down her cheeks, but no more come from her eyes. Artemis smiles, and the whole world holds its breath, waiting to find out what terrible thing is about to unleashed against it._

_One time, when they were younger, the two of them watched their father kill a man, right in front of them, his face impassive, the stillness of it clear even by just what parts of his face his mask didn’t cover._

_That was almost scarring, seeing someone kill so impassively. Jade thinks it formed a large part of her darker side that exists today._

_It does not even compare to how terrifying this smiles is, because Jade can see smeared blood across Artemis’ teeth. Can tell this is the expression she wore when she killed her victim._

_“Don’t make promises neither of us will keep Jade. I just ask that you give me a head start. But, you can’t trust anyone these days, can you? So, I guess I don’t know if you will give me so much as twenty minutes. It doesn’t matter. They won’t find me._ I’ll find them.”

_Artemis is stepping back, away from Jade’s outstretched hands, and somewhere in the part of her mind that isn’t curling into a ball and clutching its knees to its chest, Jade notices that at one point she dropped the towel she was trying to clean Artemis’ face with._

_“I just came to say goodbye, Jade. I thought, out of everybody, you were one of the few who didn't fail me and Wally, so you deserved a proper goodbye. I hope we don’t have to cross paths again. I don’t know if I can afford you the luxury of coming out alive that you so often gave to me. Take good care of Lian. I wouldn’t want my namesake having anything but the best.”_

_Artemis pauses._

_“Take care of Brucely for me and Wally, won’t you? He really loved that dog. I’m sure Lian will too.”_

\---

Eight months since his death. She checks in every two weeks or so, with a different person each time. They say she seems cheerful. One time she calls Zatanna while the Team is in the Watchtower training, and she ends up on speakerphone with all her friends. It isn’t the same as having her there, but it is so much better than when she isn’t there at all.

No one has gone to her apartment in almost a month. She seems okay, just wants some time to herself. To process, to mourn. She didn’t give herself that, at first. Just threw herself headfirst into the Team, trying to avoid facing the truth.

Facing herself.

\---

_Artemis is gone, or leaving, Jade is unsure. She is standing in a bathroom with a pool of blood in the middle, in front of the sink, blood smears and handprints on the counter, door, and a lone half-print of a hand on the wall beneath the towel rack. She is holding a red stained towel that she had numbly picked up from the floor. She suddenly remembers she still doesn’t know whose blood this is, and drops the towel in the sink as if it bit her._

_She stares, mind stuttering for what to do. She wavers a little where she stands._

_And then her mind is working again and she is scrambling for her phone, not minding the blood getting all over her jeans as she tries to get the small device out of her pocket with slippery fingers. There’s already so much red on them anyway._

_She starts a three-way call. Roy, her Roy, the Roy she loves and is currently at the zoo with Lian, on one end and Kaldur, steady Kaldur who leads the entire Team and works in the Watchtower and knows people who can find her baby sister, on the other. She might have stolen his number from Roy’s contacts awhile ago, but she needs it now. She pushes the buttons frantically, not noticing the blood she spreads onto the screen, or on her cheek as she slaps the phone against her ear, staring at the two inch thick puddle of blood at her feet._

\---

“We can give you him, once again.”

Artemis looks away, and her gaze burns with rage and want.

“No, you can’t. No one can.”

Ra’s Al Ghul laughs, but it doesn’t sound very real. Nothing he says ever really does, to Artemis. But right now, nothing feels real to her at all, anyway. Not even herself.

Ra’s moves closer, tilting his face down and resting his hand on her shoulder so she will look up at him again.

“We cannot give you his old body, or even all of his memories. Just some. Seven years ago, on your team’s first mission, the one that formed them, we were going to clone Kid Flash, Aqualad, and Robin. We had them bound, we had already taken the DNA, and we were in the process of downloading their memories when Superboy bounded in and freed them. He destroyed the computer, but, everything that happens there is constantly streamed to a backup. I need you to get me some fresher DNA, but mix that with what we already have, and your memories of him, and we can give you a new and improved version.”

Artemis meets his eyes, her face an uncaring mask, and her eyes alive.

“He won’t be himself, no matter what. He won’t be the old Wally.”

Ra’s chuckles again, but only slightly, his eyes still locked on Artemis’ as a smirk graces his features.

“No, he won’t. But, then again, you’re not the old Artemis are you? You’re something better. Something… sharper.”

Artemis smiles, a cruel twist that slashes a rip in her face. “What do I have to do?”

“Just one thing. A small favour, and then you can come with me, and we will work on him together. Create the new Wally, completely improved. A Wally finally fitting to stand at the new you’s side.”

Artemis is silent, but her face - her _eyes_ \- say enough. “What’s the favour?”

“There is someone I need taken care of. Taken out. Do that, and you can finally be with your love once again. Wally and Artemis, once more.”

“No, not Artemis. Not anymore.”

“Oh? Did you have some other name in mind?”

Artemis smiles, words echoing around in her mind.

( _“As a hero?”_

_“As a blonde.”_ )

\---

_“She can’t have gotten that far,” Jade insists, trying to push her way out of Roy’s arms, but not succeeding as her husband holds her still and away from where Batgirl is typing away furiously._

_“If anyone can find her, it’s Batgirl. All we know is that she probably isn’t anywhere near the city anymore,” Nightwing assures her, but his face is drawn, tight, and angry._

_Jade is actually standing inside the Watchtower. She never would have thought that would happen, but she never thought this would happen either._

_Artemis. Gone._

Crazy.

_Her little sister, who used to brush her hair and listen to her read Alice in Wonderland, who used to insist on being good and keeping the family together, has killed someone._

_And will kill again._

_Jade got in the same room as the Joker only once, and she avoided doing it ever again. But in the small, tile bathroom with Artemis? It was like reliving the experience._

_“Find her,” Jade whispers, her voice small and hoarse. “Bring my sister back. I promised to help her. I nee- need to help her.”_

_Jade is crying again, hiccuping as she speaks. Roy hugs her close, both of them trying not to break down and lose it._

_Nearby, Lian sits completely quiet, buckled in her carseat. She hasn’t moved, or cried, only watched._

_Roy had answered his phone as he walked in the apartment, setting Lian down. He had been so busy answering, and then staring at the blood trail, that he hadn’t noticed Lian running out of the living room, into the hall, and straight into the bathroom where Jade clutched at the counter._

_Lian’s palms are red with blood stains from slipping on the blood and catching herself, her feet bare because they ripped off the bloody shoes right away. She is very careful not to touch anything, laying her hands in her lap, palms up, and staring at where her parents clutch at each other._

\---

Nine months, exactly; she would know - she has been counting and planning. Artemis pauses in the doorway of the apartment, looking around at the living room, making sure everything is exactly as she wishes to leave it. Brucely is flopped on the couch, fast asleep. Normally, Artemis doesn’t really let him up there. The one who always put him on the furniture was Wally. But Brucely will be stuck here for up to a day alone, she figures leaving him extra food and letting him up on all the furniture, not just the bed, is the best she can do to make up for it. She cannot take him with her. He might get hurt, and having him might slow her down or blow her cover.

One last glance, just to ensure not even the corner of a book is out of place. The place will stay like this for awhile, she has to leave it in good condition.

On the table, her old green uniform lies folded neatly. Not the one she wore when Wally died. No, the one spare that she wore when they faked her death. The one with a blood stain on the front. She disposed of the other one.

One of the bookshelves lies on the floor, its contents spilled beneath and around it. Behind it, the large hidden cabinet is flung open, lock undone and all the hooks for holding weapons bare, their normal contents in the bag over Artemis’ shoulder.

She turns and leaves, her face impassive as she locks the door. Just glancing at her, you’d think she was simply leaving to go for a walk.

She thinks, perhaps, she should feel a storm inside. Or an emptiness. Maybe she should actually feel.

She doesn’t feel, and she doesn’t note an absence of feeling either. She is just serene, uncaring, the calm before the storm.

She will feel again when she has Wally. She does not care what she will feel, but she will feel once again. If she feels guilty, malicious, or gleeful, so be it.

She knows what she does tonight will end her calm, and she knows her unfeeling will end when she can hold Wally, solid and alive, in her arms.

She does not care about the consequences.

She does not care about the actions.

She just needs results.

\---

_“She could be under some kind of mind control,” Nightwing suggests, and everything about him is desperate. Sitting on the floor, head between his knees and hands gripping at his hair, elbows propping him up from his knees._

_Jade is having trouble thinking completely straight. Fitting together the Artemis she knew, the one she grew up with, and the one who grew up without her, with this new person._

_But, the most terrifying thing, is she wasn’t acting like someone else._

_She was acting like a broken, insane, damaged version of herself._

_“No,” Jade chokes, staring across the floor at Nightwing, who barely lifts his head. The image of Artemis’ face, her eyes, will not fade no matter how many times she blinks. “She’s not. She’s- she is acting of her own free will.”_

_“She can’t be,” Batgirl whispers, standing beside her digital computer screen, looking lost at the thought. Behind her, the computer is darting around different points on a map, trying to triangulate some kind of GPS that is supposed to help find Artemis._

_The image of the smile Artemis gave her, and the ghost of her laugh runs through Jade’s head. She swallows._

_“She is.”_

\---

He’s not the same.

No.

But then again, after the last year, who is?

One year. One year exactly.

His new birthday is his death date.

Artemis’ smiles is cruel and broken at that thought.

Wally runs a hand through his hair, shaking it about into that perfect disarray it always falls in. His other hand is in her’s. She breathes deeply and smiles.

“What do you think?”

“A bit different, isn’t it?”

“I thought we both needed a change. We are not the same people we were before.”

Wally laughs. “Me, especially!”

Artemis smiles in a way she hasn’t in a long time. Wally looks over at her, and his face splits in a grin, too. It is not exactly like his old smile, but close enough to still be him. Different enough - _dark enough_ \- to be the new him. The new them, at last.

“So, Tigress, we have my first _technical_ day on earth all to ourselves?”

“Just the two of us. The Light promised. Tomorrow I will show you your new costume.”

Wally smirks now, pulling her closer and wrapping his arms around her waist. “Want to give me a hint, babe?” he asks, leaning their faces together.

Before, before all of this, the old Wally would lean them close so their foreheads would rest against each other. Now, the new Wally lets their noses rest against each other, watching Artemis’ face with bright, intelligent, green eyes.

It’s all about the eyes.

“No,” she purrs, wrapping her arms around his neck. She used to move to wind them around his shoulders. “Today is about just you and me, not all the fun we are going to have later, watching all our old friends who couldn’t save you in time turn around in circles, chasing their tails when they are _trying_ to get at us.”

“Not just me,” Wally adds, looking at her with a suddenly serious expression, and Artemis looks at him questioningly. “They also failed to save you.”

Artemis draws in a breath, sharp and fast, the image of all of this suddenly crashing down around her falling over her vision. She didn’t change enough about him. She didn’t make sure that some of his old ways of thinking were changed when she was asked how he should behave and think. She didn’t and she is about to lose him because he is created to good for a psycho like her-

Wally smiles. Devious, cruel, and so very _her. “_ And I think I like it. Remind me to thank them some time.”

Artemis lets her breath leave her in a rush, pushing forward suddenly and tilting her head to give Wally his first real kiss since they released him from the cloning pod and left them alone in their new room.

“I like the new you, too,” she mumbled against his lips, not even drawing back before she went in for the second kiss.

Because she did. She could feel again, she could feel warm and gleeful and also angry at everyone she used to know for failing him. There is no guilt for what she has done - she even wants to do it more. She has being clinging on to her old reality by barely a thread, and now, she lets go. Gives in to the insanity she has been acting on, thinking about.

She lets herself feel it.

She lets herself feel him.

It feels good.

Some phrase is running around in the back of her mind. Something about being a hero. Something about not being a hero. She lets it go. She is Tigress now, not Artemis. And she has Wally now. She has Wally, and her feelings, and their shared insanity.

_( _“-So let’s see how Tigress does.”__

__“As a hero?”_ _

__“As a blonde.”)_ _

__\---_ _

Kaldur freezes, staring at the woman before him. “Artemis,” he breathes. They have found her. At last. Finally. They have found her, and now they can stop her. Help her.

Her eyes flare up, her gaze showing rage, but her expression only shifts slightly from indifference to outright boredom. “Artemis died a long time ago. It is just Tigress, now,” she states, flipping the tail of her long braid over her shoulder and behind her back.

“Not just Tigress, Blondie!” a familiar voice calls out. Kaldur’s heart would stop if he actually believed what he was hearing. But it cannot be. Wally is dead and the tone… it is off. The past year has not distorted his memories of his friend so much that he would think that he sounded like that.

Except there is a wind, a blur of mostly yellow, and also black, and then he pulls to a stop beside Artemi- Tigress.

It is not the Kid Flash uniform, much closer to the Flash, in actuality, but also distinguishably different. The yellow is a more muted colour, more gold than anything else, and some of his hair peaks out, just as vibrantly red as before.

His smile, though, is nothing like before. The expression he wears is one Wally would never have been able to contort his face into.

“There’s also Zoom, can’t forget about me,” Wally says with a flourish, wrapping arm around Tigress’ waist. She smiles, almost lovingly, and then turns her gaze back to Kaldur, and the rest of the squad behind him. “Why don’t you have a little fun with us?”

_\---_

The Watchtower has a lounge. It is large, though the entire League could never fit into it, and it has many couches and chair.

The entire team is seated on or around the couch directly in front of the television, just watching.

Watching the news station. And the footage of bleeding people being assured to the hospital. The photos of the as-of-yet unidentified people who Tigress and Zoom killed today.

Pictures, blurry and taken from a distance or in a rush, show Tigress and Zoom, almost always side by side, sometimes even holding hands. You can tell in at least half of them they are laughing. Maybe more.

No one has a clear shot of their face.

No one needs it.

The entire Alpha squad saw the two up close, backed up by the Beta squad, who were busy fighting off the Luthor Bots to actually reach the insane couple themselves.

Tigress and Zoom.

Not Artemis and Wally.

No one has used those names since they got back, slowly trickling into the lounge and gathering around the TV as they finished being patched up in the med bay one by one.

The news coverage cuts out to an overhead shot of the city, where the destruction caused to the entire downtown area clearly spells out: “Let's play.”

_\---_

“Happy half birthday to me,” Wally sings softly, crossing his arms over Tigress’ chest and linking their fingers together. Artemis laughs lightly, leaning up to kiss his cheek, avoiding the bloodspot there where Wally had gotten some random person splashed on him during their day out. It had been a fun night, quietly assassinating almost a dozen people for the Light. They had been having a lot of fun lately, ever since revealing themselves four months ago.

Artemis feels amazing. She feels alive, loved, like she is on a constant high. She thinks Wally feels similarly.

“How do you wanna celebrate?” she asks, closing her eyes and leaning back into the solid feeling of her lover.

“Same way we celebrated my first birthday. Just you and me, back at our place, with nothing else to do for the whole day. Maybe throw in a bottle of that cheap wine you like,” Wally says, humming lightly as he moves them so they face the car ready to take them back to base. Artemis hears the slight sound of his breathing shifting, as his smile turns to a smirk. She opens her mouth to ask him what it is, but finds herself being swept off her feet, hauled up into his arms and carried, bridal style, towards the vehicle.

“Love you, babe,” Wally says, happily, still grinning as he carries her easily with the strength he has been building up. She winds her arms around his neck, hanging on and grinning at him.

“I love you, too,” she says, affectionately, reaching over to wipe off the blood before planting a kiss where it had marked his cheek. “Let’s go home. We’ll raise hell tomorrow.”

Literally.

She can’t wait to see how the Justice League tries to stop them. She wonders if anyone will die.

Like they deserve to, for letting Wally almost be lost to her forever.

For today, though, she smiles at Wally and kisses him again.

_\---_

_Bart blinks at Artemis, and then smiles. It wasn’t the funniest joke, but she is still recovering from Wally’s death._

_“Right,” he says grinning. “We’ll see how Tigress does _as a blonde_.”_

_Artemis smiles at him, and there is something just slightly off about the way her mouth twists upward. He doesn’t really take note of it. They are standing in front of the hologram of her recently-killed partner. Everybody should get a little leniency is this situation._

_“As a blonde,” Artemis murmurs, turning away to leave the sanctuary. This place makes her think she should feel dirty._

_Makes her think she should feel._

**Author's Note:**

> Whew! I've been wanting to write this for awhile(Like, a month and a half.) and haven't had time until now. I kind of rambled a bit, but I needed to get this out.  
> I just wanted to note that I don't think this will or want this to happen. I was just rewatching the ending and the phrase "As a blonde." kind of stuck with me and I thought about what if Artemis went to the other side, and worked with her sister and wouldn't they make a great pair of criminals. Then somehow the fact that I wanted Jade to become good made this form into this thing in my head.


End file.
